Obituary

1936, November 23rd

Lord Joicey, who was chairman and managing director of the Lambton, Hetton and Joicey Collieries, the largest in the Durham coalfield, died on Saturday night at his seat, Ford Castle, Northumberland, at the age of 90. About two years ago he had a serious illness, but recovered and continued well until early in October.

James Joicey was born at Tanfield, in the County of Durham, on April 4, 1846, and received his education at Gainford Academy, near Darlington, where he worked hard and played cricket, football, and fives, interests which he maintained till well into middle life. His father, George Joicey, who was a partner in the engineering firm of Joicey and Co., at the Forth Banks Engine Works, Newcastle-on-Tyne, died while he was still in school. On the day that he entered his eighteenth year Joicey went into the Newcastle office of two of his uncles, who were at the head of the firm of James Joicey and Co., coalowners, whose pits even at that time had a yearly output of 1,000,000 tons. The post was intended for his elder brother, the late Jacob Joicey, who, however, preferred engineering.

When Lord Joicey was entertained by his colleagues on Newcastle Quayside on the completion of his commercial jubilee in 1913, he said he had had to start at the bottom of the ladder, it having been part of his duties to take down the office shutters and fetch the letters every morning. When he came of age he was presented with one-sixteenth share in the family business, and was given a partnership. Five years later he became managing partner, and on the death of his uncles he acquired the major part of their interest in the undertaking.

In 1896 he acquired from Lord Durham the famous Lambton Collieries, and in 1911 he negotiated the purchase from Sir Lindsay Wood of the Hetton Collieries. It was no accident that each of these purchases was completed opportunely for enabling the new owner to reap the full advantage of a coal trade boom. They gave home some claim to the distinction, which was popularly conferred on him in his own part of the country, of being the largest coalowner in the world.

As an employer Lord Joicey's relations with his workpeople were friendly. Serious disputes were few, and were universally recognised as being due to circumstances outside his personal control. He provided cottages, miners' institutes, churches, chapels, and schools. On the passing of the Workmen's Liability Act, when for a time the Miners' Permanent Relief Fund hung in the balance, Messrs. Joicey were the first to announce their intention to continue their subscription as heretofore. It was on the commercial side that Lord Joicey's personal activities mainly lay, and here he won admiration quite as much by his sterling integrity as by his business capacity. He was for many years a director of the North-Eastern Railway, and became vice-chairman in 1912. But he always refused to join the boards of companies unless he had special knowledge of particular business and could afford the time to attend to it. At his death he was chairman of only three companies.

In politics he was a faithful follower of Mr. Gladstone in that statesman's lifetime, and thereafter an uncompromising advocate of free imports, but in other respects not a little independent in his Liberalism. He sat in the House of Commons for the Chester-le-Street Division from 1885 to the end of 1905, when he was raised to the peerage. He had been made a baronet in 1893. He was a generous supporter of the party funds, and from 1885 to 1904, he maintained the Newcastle Daily Leader in the Liberal interest, expending from first to last well over £100,000 on this venture. But the paper was not supported by the Liberal rank and file, and in 1904 he disposed of the major part of his interest.

In common with many others of his generation Lord Joicey watched the later developments of Liberal policy, from 1906 onwards, with misgivings. In October, 1909, he resigned the presidency of the Montgomeryshire Borough Liberal Association as he could not support the Budget, and in November, 1910, he was complaining that the Liberal Ministers had brains but no backbone. A characteristic letter in The Times in May, 1912, showed him to be a Home Ruler with reservations. Socialism had long seemed to him to be the great national danger, and in the summer of 1931 he supported the Conservative Party "in an independent capacity." He criticised he interference of politicians in industry, especially the coal trade, and was an opponent both of women sufferage and of the "dole."

Lord Joicey resigned in February, 1933, the presidency of the Newcastle Chamber of Commerce, which he had held for 25 years. He was a past president of the Mining Association of Great Britain, and had been for many years president of the Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-on-Tyne. He had been J.P. and D.L., for Durham County since 1883, and was also a magistrate for Northumberland, Montgomeryshire, and Newcastle.

In spite of his busy life Lord Joicey always kept himself physically fit. While he was yet in his teens he rescued three persons from drowning at Whitley Bay, and until middle life he was a keen cricketer and tennis player. In his later years his favourite recreations were golf and shooting. He was the owner of some representative examples of the art of Gainsborough and Turner, and of a fine collection of water-colours.

Lord Joicey married in 1879 Amy, daughter of Mr. Joseph Robinson, J.P., of North Shields. She died in 1881, leaving two sons, of whom the elder, the Hon. James Arthur Jociey, late major in the 7th Battalion, The Northumberland Fusiliers, T.F., born in 1880, succeeds to the barony and baronetcy. The new peer married in 1905 Georgeina Wharton, daughter of Major A. E. Burdon, and has three daughters. He is vice-president of the Lambton, Hetton, and Joicey Collieries. The younger son is Colonel the Hon. H. E. Joicey, D.S.O., late 14th Hussars, who married Lady Joan Lambton and had two sons. In 1884 Lord Joicey married Margerite Smyles, daughter of Colonel Drever, H.F.I.C.S., a lady of exceptional gifts, who took an active part in the public and social life and Durham County. She died in 1911. Her elder son was killed in action in 1916, her younger son died in 1915, and her only daughter died in 1924.

The funeral will be at Ford Church to-morrow at 2.30.

Source: The Times